Katana VentraIP

Parkland high school shooting

The Parkland high school shooting was a mass shooting that occurred on February 14, 2018, when 19-year-old Nikolas Cruz opened fire on students and staff at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in the Miami metropolitan area city of Parkland, Florida, killing 17 people[note 2] and injuring 17 others.[2][3][4] Cruz, a former student at the school, fled the scene on foot by blending in with other students and was arrested without incident approximately one hour and twenty minutes later in nearby Coral Springs.[5] Police and prosecutors investigated "a pattern of disciplinary issues and unnerving behavior".[6]

Parkland high school shooting

February 14, 2018 (February 14, 2018)
2:21 – 2:27 p.m. (EST)

Students and staff at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School

17

17

34 consecutive life sentences without the possibility of parole

Two lawsuits by families of victims settled

  • Lawsuit against school district settled for $25 million
  • Lawsuit against federal government settled for $125 to $130 million

The incident is the deadliest mass shooting at a high school in U.S. history. The shooting came at a period of heightened public support for gun control that followed mass shootings in Paradise, Nevada, and in Sutherland Springs, Texas, in October and November 2017.


Students at Parkland founded Never Again MSD, an advocacy group that lobbies for gun control. On March 9, Governor Rick Scott signed a bill that implemented new restrictions to Florida's gun laws and also allowed for the arming of teachers who were properly trained and the hiring of more school resource officers.[7][8]


The Broward County Sheriff's Office received widespread criticism for its handling of the police response, both for not following up on multiple warnings about Cruz despite a lengthy record of threatening behavior and for staying outside the school instead of immediately confronting him.[9] This led to the resignations of several police officers who responded to the scene, and the removal of Sheriff Scott Israel.[9] A commission appointed by then-Governor Scott to investigate the shooting condemned the police inaction and urged school districts across the state to adopt greater measures of security.[9][10]


On October 20, 2021, Cruz pleaded guilty to all charges and apologized for his crimes. The prosecution sought the death penalty, and a four-month death penalty trial was expected to commence in January 2022.[11] After suffering numerous delays, in part due to the COVID-19 pandemic, the trial commenced on July 18, 2022.[12][13] On October 13, 2022, a jury unanimously agreed that Cruz was eligible for the death penalty, but deadlocked on whether it should be imposed, resulting in a recommendation to sentence him to life imprisonment without the possibility of parole.[14] On November 2, 2022, Cruz was sentenced to life without parole, in accordance with a Florida law requiring the court not to depart from the jury's recommendation.[15][16] The unanimity required to impose the death penalty has since been overturned by a bill signed by Governor Ron DeSantis, partly as a result of Cruz's sentencing.

Assault weapons legislation in the United States

Extreme Risk Protection Order

Federal Assault Weapons Ban

Gun politics in the United States

List of attacks related to secondary schools

List of disasters in the United States by death toll

List of rampage killers (school massacres)

List of school shootings in the United States

– similar school shooting in Texas in May 2018

2018 Santa Fe High School shooting

– school shooting that occurred on Valentine's Day, exactly 10 years earlier

Northern Illinois University shooting

archive footage pertaining to the Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School shooting

Court TV

diagram of the movements within Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School on the afternoon of the shootings, released to the public April 2018

Broward County Sheriff's Office

Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School Public Safety Commission. June 16, 2018, at the Wayback Machine

Archived

Contemporary detailing Cruz's formal sentencing to life imprisonment without parole

news article

on YouTube (2:11)

Message from principal of Stoneman Douglas High School, Ty Thompson

on YouTube (26:46)

"#MSDStrong Documentary", a video produced by students at Stoneman Douglas High School after the incident

Draft report of the incident from the Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School Public Safety Commission